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FT scoops two Association of Online Publishers Awards 2008

The Financial Times scooped two top industry awards last night at the annual AOP Online Publishing Awards ceremony. FT.com won the AOP Innovation Award, in recognition of the successful launch of its access model, and was also awarded Best Use of Video.

The Innovation Award is a testament to the success of FT.com’s ground-breaking access model, launched in October 2007, which has successfully combined audience and traffic with a loyal subscriber base. Judges commented that the model “showed a great understanding of usage patterns, a smart use of technology and enabled significant growth whilst preserving a premium positioning.”

The model works by allowing all users access to up to five articles a month for free, followed by a ‘light’ registration. For more than 30 articles a month readers need to subscribe.

Rob Grimshaw, Managing Director of FT.com said: “The AOP awards are highly prestigious and the FT is proud to be recognised as a digital innovator by the online media industry. Since we revolutionised our access model, FT.com has attracted over 600,000 registered users. Video and multimedia content are a key component of FT.com and we are committed to delivering the best content to our readers across all channels.”

FT.com also won the AOP award for Use of Video for an ongoing commitment to bring high quality video content and excellence in journalism online, together with strong commercial results. The judges concluded that FT.com has “shown total commitment to putting video at the heart of their communication. With watchable video content that does more than simply extending their brand online, they have gone that extra mile, with an impressive ROI.”

The news builds on FT.com breaking the one million monthly video views barrier for the first time in 2008 and the successful launch of the FT Mini Player in July. The new video player is embedded in news and feature articles online, allowing users easier access to high quality video content embedded in news stories. FT.com now produces over 150 videos every month.